Sometimes you wake up and say, “I’d love to do an article that’ll get me destroyed on the internet.” Well, today is one of those days, and what better topic than Disney—a company and fandom that’s totally cool, normal, and not at all completely terrifying?
Recently, my wife Jayne and I were cooking and told our Alexa device to play some Disney songs. The list was pretty obvious but it got us thinking about just how many incredible songs there have been over the years. This then led to a heated debate over dinner prep and that’s never a good thing when knives are involved. Which is to say, I knew this was a topic that people would have very strong opinions about, but also that I should probably write without my wife’s input for fear of lifelong retribution. Instead, I present it to the internet, a place that will surely be understanding and respectful. A place where it’s obvious lists are subjective and open to debate.
To that point, nowhere will this list be called “definitive,” especially since we’re limiting this strictly to Walt Disney Animation films. So no Mary Poppins, no Nightmare Before Christmas, no Pixar, and, most crucially to me, no High School Musical. Even with those exclusions though, narrowing down over 80 years of movies into 10 songs is, well, damn near impossible. For example, here’s a teeny tiny sampling of stone-cold classics that didn’t make my list: “A Whole New World” from Aladdin, “Bibbidi-Bobbidi-Boo” from Cinderella, “Belle” from Beauty and the Beast, “Circle of Life” from The Lion King, “Part of Your World” from The Little Mermaid, as well as everything from Moana, Hercules, The Emperor’s New Groove, Pocahontas, Tarzan, Mulan, and about three dozen others. So what exactly is on this list?